Malloy @6:22 -- "The reality of large capacity magazines is they do allow a madman, or a disturbed individual, or someone with malice, or for that matter, someone who wants to fight against the federal government for whatever reason..."

No matter, People who won't send an email, forward a link or even install Adblock will endure indeterminately-extended real world hardships and sacrifices to save us!

And they'll do it smugly, too, with an air of amused Que sera, sera superiority, although I would be curious to know what practical and moral leadership such people have shown at averting literal hell on earth, up close and personal. Cede the entire political arena to those who would rule all, without lifting a finger? Ingenious!

Meantime, I was forwarded this story from May of this year by a reader about Dave Ragozzine, who wrote "Anyone can have a blog, who cares what the dude says(?)"

Mr. Ragozzine, it seems, scared the politicos of Connecticut for saying this on-line:

“If you really want to save your state and country, you will become disobedient and do God’s work to save this nation,” Ragozzine allegedly wrote. “We need violence, we need to take out the scumbags. Locally, Malloy needs to be taken out. He must pay in blood for the crimes he has committed against this country, this state, and the constitution. Our founders and the first 111% wouldn’t have let him last one day in office.”

These were judged to be injudicious statements by the Connecticut State Police, the story continues:

Ragozzine, of 17 Mountain View Terrace, Apt. 3, in Winchester, was arraigned Friday in Superior Court on charges of inciting injury to a person or property, a Class C felony, and second-degree threatening.

Now, as the CSP is also investigating me for the quadruple sins of making a seditious speech, smuggling forbidden magazines, writing open letters, and posting the home addresses and phone numbers of the tyrants who passed the Intolerable Act, I am sympathetic to Mr. Ragozzine's situation. I will say that my own words and actions were chosen a bit more carefully than his, but that hasn't prevented the authorities from trying to figure out how to nail my ass to Red Mike "KGB" Lawlor's barn door. Thus, as I have skin in this Connecticut game, I would be curious to know what the disposition of Mr. Ragozzine's case was.

It was another very rough night. I should already be on the ground in Connecticut but I'm headed to the doctor this morning. Plans have shifted, folks on the ground I counted on cannot, it seems, be counted on (in some cases due to circumstances beyond their control). Resources are thin, but thanks to some of you (and God bless Westchester NY in addition to the indomitable regulars!) it is still possible to get there but the window of time to do what I intended is collapsing. Rosey thinks God is trying to tell me something but that's just because she is, and has earned the right to be, a little selfish.

To those who expected me today, I can only apologize and attempt to salvage what I can. It has always been my intention to confront Red Mike "KGB" Lawlor on his own ground. I WILL get there. I just can't say when at this point. I'll have more later.

My favorite comment is from Dave Ragozzine, who writes: "Anyone can have a blog, who cares what the dude says(?)" Truer words were never spoken. Of course, most typical is this reaction to David's piece from Bob Richardson: "I no longer go to the Examiner website because of all the intrusive and vocal ads." I wonder how all those folks like Richardson really expect us to believe that they will be there at muzzle-point shouting "Molon Labe" opposing the evil machine when they, a. lack the intelligence and/or gumption to obtain a free ad-blocker so they can read David's work without further bother and, b., are so easily deflected from the search for truth by mere momentary inconvenience. And we are expected to think of such people as serious allies?

The only thing more ridiculous are the chest-thumpers who say they want to "get it on" now before they grow too old for the fight. Really? Are they ready for a civil war? Have they made all the preparations they need to? Have they trained, networked, worked the intelligence problem, or any of a million things necessary to prepare for such an eventuality? Do they even understand what that means, what the human cost would be? Recently, I walked with Bob Wright through the national cemetery at Shiloh battlefield park in Tennessee. We talked about what he called "the tiger talkers" and how he wished that he could drag all of them through the cemetery to get some idea of the reality of civil war, of the cost in blood and tears and irretrievable human potential.

In clinging to the competing notions that this is some form of political game without future cost, or, to the equally naive idea that "we can whip 'em easy," both sides demonstrate an unthinking ignorance that they will be swiftly and violently disabused of come the awful dawn of real civil war. In these illusions they are the doppelgangers of the collectivists who believe that just because they win an election that cloaks them in the color of law, the rest of us will meekly fall in line for their tyranny when they say so.

But the paradigm, as they say, is about to shift and there is a rough beast slouching toward Bethlehem, Connecticut to be born.

We have the promise, whispered in the halls of power in Connecticut, that the gun raids begin after Malloy's re-election. It is past time to seriously consider what will ensue when that happens. When the first innocents are dead in their living rooms, what then will the timid trolls and the tiger talkers DO? They should give some consideration to that eventuality now, for if Malloy is re-elected it is coming. Believe me, it WILL come.

"I'll either get traction, and take this race in a three- or four-way, or I'll be irrelevant." -- Joe Visconti.

A long-time fighter for firearm rights in Connecticut commented to me:

I will tell you that right now we have a pretty large problem with a third party candidate (Joe Visconti) who is seeking to torpedo the election because he is upset that he didn't get a GOP nod.

For some reason, we have a contingent of people in Connecticut that think this guy is 'pro-gun' (we are not 'pro-gun', we are pro-rights, but I digress), when he openly advocates for mandating unloaded carry (condition 3) because of one person having a negligent discharge in a bagel shop, and openly states that our 2013 Gun Ban went 'too far' and would repeal the 'magazine portion' of the bill (but not the rest of the 130+ page monstrosity).

He is running under 9% in the polls at the moment. Just enough to act as a spoiler, but with no chance to win. . .

There is quite a bit of speculation of whether he is really this stupid/insane or whether he is a Malloy plant. I think there is a lot more evidence for the former than the latter, but neither seem to be off the table when you consider his behavior.

In support of this, I received the October issue of Connecticut Carry's October newsletter, and among the articles is this op-ed. I reprint it in its entirety, as well as the analysis piece that follows it, because it describes where we are in Connecticut, a state that is only awaiting the re-election Malloy and his anti-firearm commissar Red Mike "KGB" Lawlor for the gun raids -- and the subsequent civil war -- to begin.

Joe Must Go

by Bob Margolis.

It’s time for you to go, Joe. You’ve probably worked harder than anyone else in the race for governor, but in your heart you know you can’t win.

You’ve campaigned on valiantly as the “other guy” and while there’s merit to that, at some point you’re only going to hurt the chances for the state of Connecticut to elect someone that is not Gov. Dannel P. Malloy.

You told me face to face several times that your objective was to get Malloy out of office. You now have the best opportunity of any one in the state to do that. While you have gathered support from some independents, some Republicans and a few Democrats, we all know that as the election gets closer people will cast their vote for someone that they think can win. That candidate is not you, Joe.

You have few funds and little name recognition outside of a small circle of influence and what worries me most is that Malloy is now saying good things about you. Our governor is playing you like a fine fiddle Joe. Gov. Malloy knows that his only threat in this election is Tom Foley, not Joe Visconti. Nearly every vote cast for you will be a vote taken away from Tom Foley. The closer the election, the more dangerous your participation becomes.

Why do you think that the attack ads only go after Mr. Foley and not you? Because their side wants you to get votes Joe, as many as it takes to swing the numbers their way. The governor and his team are not stupid, they’re playing you for a fool, and I know you’re not a fool.

Joe, you have the chance to be “Rudy” for Connecticut. You have the chance to be carried off the field held high on the shoulders of the winning team. You also
have the chance to be the spoiler, to be the one that hands the election to the incumbent. I’m asking you to be Rudy. Joe, be Rudy for us, be Rudy for everyone
in Connecticut. By doing that, you can come back some day and run for office again, next time as a hero, not a spoiler. Withdraw from the election Joe, get out of
the race and ask your supporters to vote for Tom Foley. Campaign with Tom and campaign for Tom. He’s the best chance we have of taking back our state.

In addition to this op-ed is this analysis by Rick Burgess, "Are We Going To Lose This Election?":

No one wants to be the one to say it. Connecticut Carry sure doesn’t want to have to be the ones to have to say it. But we are in serious risk of losing this election. We have Malloy on the run with poll numbers from Malloy-friendly polling institutes that cannot hide the fact that Connecticut residents hate Governor Dannel Malloy and his policies and favor Republican challenger Tom Foley.

So how can we lose?

We have a contingent of people who have decided that ‘principle’ and ‘rights’ mean more to them than the basic common sense of voting the worst anti-rights governor in the nation out. Now, let’s be clear here: We support and stand on principles and rights more than any organization in Connecticut. We opposed bills that other organizations were actively supporting because the bills were against individual rights and therefore unacceptable to us, and we are proud of that. We support the absolute right to bear arms, and do not advocate for laws that prohibit anyone from buying, owning or carrying a self-defense tool in whatever manner that they see fit. But what some have decided is standing on principles and rights is, in fact, guaranteeing a loss to Governor Malloy by splitting the vote with a candidate who cannot win, and who would not fulfill the promises he has made anyway.

The center of this problem is candidate Joe Visconti, who is supposedly, the ‘pro-gun’ pick for governor despite there not being a single pro-rights organization endorsing him, and for good reason. When we look into his background and public statements, we do not need to look very far to see that he is completely incompatible with a belief in principles and individual rights. In a recorded video that he made, he stated unequivocally that he believes that since a Bridgeport officer negligently discharged a round through the glass window of the bagel shop, where he was sitting, the solution should be that officers state-wide be mandated to carry unloaded firearms. He went on to say that, if he were governor, he would make that policy happen. What would then happen if/when there were a mass shooting under his administration? His thought pattern, about penalizing every innocent person for the stupid actions of one person, does not bode well for the law-abiding citizens of Connecticut. Visconti's logic is the same logic used by anti-rights politicians like Governor Malloy.

Unfortunately, Visconti's most adamant supporters have decided to hold this election hostage, with many of them openly stating their belief that if Visconti does not win then we all deserve Malloy and the consequences that will come from Malloy's re-election. This hostage-election situation makes Visconti's campaign nothing less than a torpedo aimed, under false colors, trying to sink Foley, instead of sinking the anti-Rights regime of Malloy. It is almost as if Visconti is deliberately trying to help Malloy win and float away unscathed. Visconti claims to want citizen Rights restored, yet he continues to allow Malloy to flatter him and encourage him, knowing all the while that he, Visconti, cannot win this race for Governor. How can Visconti claim to have the interests of citizen Rights at heart, when he continues to play into the hands of anti-Rights Malloy? Visconti's intemperate ego and illogical stubbornness has caused many people to wonder whether the Visconti campaign might actually be run by the Malloy campaign. While that is only idle speculation, without any evidence, one thing is for certain, the Visconti campaign is not about ‘gun rights’ or the right to bear arms, it is about him as an individual candidate who does not have the best interests of Connecticut residents in mind. From where we view this, Visconti, for his own personal gain, is exploiting his supporters who yearn for the uninfringed right to self-defense.

Normally, such a third person campaign would not be great concern. However, Visconti’s support has been variously polled at 9%. Despite the ridiculously low number that 9% represents, in most elections; in the context of THIS election, that 9% may be more than enough to hand the election to Governor Malloy. In the last election, Tom Foley only lost by 6%. According to the various polls, this race is shaping up to be an even closer one. Worse still, Visconti has somehow convinced himself and his supporters that, although he is polling at 9% (or less), they think and believe that he is not just capable of winning the election, but they insist that he is likely to win the election. Wishful thinking is nothing new in politics, but in this case, the wishful thinking of Visconti and his supporters may well cause the sounding of the death knell for our constitutional Rights in this state.

For months Connecticut Carry has been discussing the likely ramifications of Malloy’s re-election. If Malloy is re-elected, there will be nothing that anyone can do to slow the collectivist march of the anti-rights organizations and politicians. IF Malloy is re-elected, we may well expect that he will try to push for the complete denial and excision of the Right to carry a firearm, even going so far as to try to have our Constitution re-written to remove Section 15. So, if we can't, won't, or don't oust Malloy in this election, do NOT be surprised at his next drastic anti-Rights, anti-gun policy focus. Losing the Right to carry a firearm is the area
where we have the most to lose.

For pro-Rights citizens, the simple truth of this election is the question of, how can we remove Governor Dannel Malloy from office? For pro-Rights people, this is an absolute must. We are already burdened by unconstitutional and grievous gun laws. IF we endure the Visconti-made schism among pro-Rights voters, we also must face the distinct possibility of a Malloy win. A Malloy win would certainly bring about a most horrible flood of gun laws that would even more drastically hurt our way of life, worse than any of us have imagined, until now.

Although most of us now recognize the need for Visconti to drop out of the race and to support Foley, there is, still, a small contingent of people who persist in asking questions like ‘What do we know about Tom Foley’? Most importantly, we KNOW that Foley is NOT Governor Malloy. We KNOW that Foley has not gone out of his way to infringe upon the Rights of citizens, as Malloy has done. We also KNOW that the STRONGEST message we can send to politicians, and the anti-gun crowd, is to remove Governor Malloy from office. And, we KNOW that Tom Foley is polling at 50+%, with Dannel Malloy teetering at about the same level. Therefore, we KNOW that Tom Foley is the only candidate who stands ANY CHANCE of being elected to oust Malloy, if we do NOT want Malloy to get back in. But, Foley can ONLY beat Malloy IF we all stick together. Vote for Foley, against Malloy. We KNOW that we can ONLY get Malloy out IF we vote for Foley and do NOT vote for that third candidate.

Is all lost? Should we just give up? NO! But, this needs your absolute attention. Pro-Rights citizens have a LOT of work to do, yet, to get every pro-Rights, anti-Malloy voter to the polls on Election Day, and to get those voters to vote for Foley. You need to talk to everyone that you can and let them know that there is only box to check, this election: VOTE FOLEY to unseat Malloy. It is going to require every
single one of us getting out there and doing it. We hate that there is no other reasonable choice, but this is how these battles are won. It is time to do the right thing and just get Malloy out. Once Malloy is out of office, THEN we get to play the long game and work on getting better candidates to run for office. Voting for Visconti will accomplish none of these goals.

Rally everyone you can and vote Malloy out of office. We only get one chance at this.

Rich Burgess

President, Connecticut Carry

Burgess is right to point out that more firearm restrictions will happen under a second Malloy regime, but that is beside the main point. We won't have to worry about future legislation since the shooting will have already begun before that happens. Malloy and Lawlor are merely waiting for the re-election to be over to begin the gun raids. Gentlemen and ladies, I predict to you that if Malloy is re-elected there will be dead innocents at the hands of the Connecticut State Police by January, thus beginning the next American civil war. Viscounti must have heard the same rumors wafting out of the Governor's office that I have. He must know what portends.

Was Viscounti screwed over by the CT GOP elite in the primary process? His supporters say that he was and I have no reason to doubt it. Is he the "better" candidate on firearm rights than Foley? Connecticut Carry, CCDL (who still seems to have lost my address and phone number -- rumor has it that I make them nervous) and other people in CT I trust seem to doubt it. But let's say for the sake of argument that he is. We are not playing for ideological debating points here, or even political principle. What hangs over this election more than any other in this election cycle or in any since 1860 is nothing less than civil war -- butchery of innocents on a vast scale. For what starts in Connecticut under the anti-American, Soviet-loving Mike Lawlor will not stay in Connecticut. This is not hypothetical. Based on the promises of the antis in the Malloy regime this is as real as it gets.

So one must ask, is this what Joe Viscounti had in mind when he decided to assuage his case of bruised ego and chapped ass at the way he has been treated?

I can understand their concern. Credible reports indicate that the tyrannical twins are merely waiting for Malloy's re-election to release the uniformed attack dogs of the Connecticut gun stasi (oops, sorry, state police) in raids all over the state. Perhaps they should be handing out leaflets at firearm emporiums illustrating where the Governor wants the majority of CT gun owners to reside come January.

Here is a picture of the entrance to Connecticut's maximum security MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution:

Government has proven itself to be a predator of people's liberties and economic security and, worse, an incompetent one as well. Folks who are willing to trade "essential liberty for a little temporary safety" in Franklin's words are outraged to discover that they get nothing for the swap.

But the American people are first and foremost a practical people. If the government (or political party, local law enforcement, hell, even the fire department) fails many of us will make our own arrangements. Hence the "prepper" phenomenon, the Minutemen on the border during the Bush presidency, and the reinvigoration of the 1990s constitutional militia movement under Obama (although not along the same lines as their predecessors).

Our fictional tastes reflect our real fears that things are out of control -- that it is, if not truly apocalyptic, then certainly the end of the world as we have known it. I mean, does this excrement bear any relationship to the country that you and I grew up in? People understand that it does not, the future seems grim and unrelenting and they turn to fiction that expresses their unease. They turn to "the useful dire warning."

As David Brin, author of the magnificent book The Postman (which bears no resemblance to the Costner cinematic flop), wrote in a forward to a reprint of Pat Frank's classic Alas, Babylon:

Two books that emerged at roughly the same time as Alas, Babylon were Eugene Burdick's Fail Safe and Peter George's Red Alert, which later inspired Stanley Kubrick to make the magnificently humorous and thoughtful Dr. Strangelove. As archetypes of the useful dire warning, each dissected a specific possible failure mode, bringing it to the awareness of so many that, ironically, their particular type of debacle became much less likely. Indeed, the "self-preventing prophecy" may be the highest and most useful species in all of the vast, imaginative genus of speculative fiction. In much the same way that Orwell's 1984 girded millions against "Big Brother," these tales may have helped to keep their own nightmares from coming true. In other words, our most vivid nightmares may have been utterly practical, helping to save our lives. -- David Brin, Forward to the First Harper Perennial Modern Classics Edition of Pat Frank's 'Alas, Babylon', 2005, p. X.

The Walking Dead is a perfect example of art imitating life imitating art. There is a pandemic that gets out of control (can you say CDC?), and the world is swamped with "walkers," yet in the last episode the question is posed and answered, "Which is worse, the undead or people?" Predatory humanity is of course the answer. Even at TEOTWAWKI, humanity remains humanity, or should I say, inhumanity. A glance at the latest ISIS beheading video confirms that.

And what can be the antidote to ISIS/TWD cannibals/zombies in the light of abject government failure? Judge Napolitano hits the nail on the head
here: http://sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com/2014/10/what-is-best-deterrent-to-that-armed.html

It may be a poor substitute for a government that is supposed to be doing its constitutional job competently, but the bald statistics of Obama as the preeminent firearm salesman in world history demonstrates that the common folk internalized that lesson long before the chattering class. They will make their own arrangements, these practical Americans, and they will watch/read "useful dire warnings" for clues as to how best cope with the end of the world as they have known it.

Mike Vanderboegh

PS: One other thing that bears mentioning. Have you noticed that just as The Invasion of the Body Snatchers was a metaphor for communist infiltration in the 50s, that "zombies" resemble present day collectivists? They are ravenous, hard to stop, go around in bunches, cannot be negotiated with or reasoned with, only walled out or confronted with deadly force. It is no accident that zombie targets are far more popular at firearm ranges these days than bullseyes. Wanna shoot a collectivist and still be under the radar? Shoot a zombie target. Nobody objects to that, perhaps because they can't break the code. I mean, what is the functional difference, if any, between Nancy Pelosi and a flesh-eating zombie? ;-)

The Pace Properties Manager disclosed that the property management team “met with local authorities/police recently to discuss their plans and recommendations for dealing with possible demonstrations and civil unrest after the grand jury decision is announced on the Michael Brown shooting.”

The latest season has introduced a cannibal cult (now defeated) that Rick and his merry band have had to overcome. Yet for folks who have supposedly been living by their wits for years now (and whose group includes military veterans), they still haven't learned how to move as a group with point men and flankers, nor how to maintain listening/observation posts when stationary, nor even rudimentary perimeter security. People are always haring off on their own and getting into trouble or endangering the group. I mean, how did these people stay alive this long, other than the good graces of the writer's imagination?

Never forget Dobyns was one of the ATF thugs who attacked the Constitution in the course of his ATF "duties". He's just another badged thug, now former, who compromised his principles and his oath to defend the Constitution. May he rot in hell with all the other badged, tyrannical, .gov scum.

Another anonymous commenter writes:

There are no "good guys" in the ATF. All of them are domestic enemies of the Constitution. Internal spats like this may be a source of amusement, but under no circumstances should anyone who has ever arrested someone for a "federal firearms violation" be considered an ally of the freedom movement.

I have had emails in a similar vein, many of them more vehement and obscene than these. To that I would respond with this inconvenient fact: The Fast and Furious scandal would not have been uncovered without the assistance of Jay Dobyns, Vince Cefalu and the agents of CleanUpATF.org. Go that? Would.NOT. Jay Dobyns is hardly a perfect person. Nor is Vince Cefalu. Nor am I. Nor, I daresay, are any of you readers. Philosophically we disagree on many things, Dobyns, Cefalu and I. If you are looking for perfect people to restore liberty in this country you will come up short of the required number.

Another observation: People change and what seems to be right to them, even to their own understanding of how the universe works, can be changed -- in an instant or over time -- in the face of newly-demonstrated realities. I offer myself and my Benedict Arnold-period embrace of communism as a perfect example of that. Yet God chooses many imperfect instruments to carry out His will. The longer I live, the more convinced I am of that. As I said Cefalu and Dobyns would still disagree with me on many things and I with them, but what we discovered in the crucible of working on Fast and Furious and other ATF scandals was that men and women who disagree about many things can still find common cause in certain other, bigger, things. Among these are truth, fairness, and resistance to arbitrary power and the secrecy that it covets.

Try also to remember that if Michael Collins had adopted the attitude that there were "no good guys" in the Royal Irish Constabulary, all of Ireland would still be British.

Rosey had some accumulated days off at work, so yesterday she took one and carried me to see the new war movie, Fury. Fury is a gritty look at armored and armored infantry combat in World War II, and it presents the dangers American tankers and their supporting infantry faced. My Uncle Bill was an armored infantryman in World War II, and I wish now that I had asked him more questions about his experiences when he was alive. One thing that came through loud and clear to me was Bill's absolute hatred of Nazis and especially the SS. From the few conversations I had with him after I was grown up enough to appreciate them, I got the feeling that members of the Waffen SS had a tough time surrendering to Bill's outfit, especially after news of the Malmedy massacre got around. This is portrayed in the movie with unblinking eye.

The time is April 1945 and as the Americans move deeper into Germany they come across evidence of Nazi atrocities, including the summary execution of civilians (including children) who are deemed by the SS to be "deserters" to the cause of the Fatherland. Their bodies are left dangling from telephone poles with signs on them. One SS officer captured in the movie is summarily executed after the burgomaster, in response to a question from Brad Pitt's character, condemns him with a nod as one of the ones who has been executing children.

In another scene, a German soldier is captured wearing a GI overcoat. This outrages the tankers and armored infantrymen. Subsequently he is shot and Rosey did not understand why. He was a prisoner, after all, and due the protections of the Geneva Convention. I pointed out that the coat didn't seem to have any holes in it or blood on it. What pissed off the armored infantrymen was that the guy had probably made his captive strip it off. Had he killed the GI afterward? We cannot know, but the GIs, as with all soldiers in combat, assumed the worst, hence he had to die. Somebody in that unsympathetic crowd was bound to shoot him, although how he meets his end at the unwilling hands of a green replacement is perhaps the most controversial scene in the movie. I don't think my Uncle Bill would have quibbled with it's portrayal, though.

The fact that there were absolutely green replacements with no tank experience used in the latter part of the war is incontrovertible. This was made necessary by the ghastly casualty rates among tankers as they pitted their substandard, poorly armed and armored Shermans against superior German tanks. (Worse than the other defects was the fact that our tanks were gasoline-powered, which made them so susceptible to "brewing up" in a ball of flame when hit that the British called them "Ronsons" after their cigarette lighter.) As Third Armored Division ordnance officer Belton Y. Cooper wrote in his memoir Death Traps The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II, his division entered France with 232 Sherman tanks, but by the end of the war, it had lost 648 Shermans totally destroyed, and an additional 700 had been knocked out of action and later repaired - a loss rate of 580%. Men -- trained armored crewmen -- died along with those tanks (a full crew for a Sherman was five, although losses often dictated that a tank might have to operate with as few as three men) and the stateside replacements could not be trained fast enough to make good the losses, hence the use of raw place-fillers. That, in turn, got a lot of other good men killed, something that is portrayed in Fury with an unblinking eye.

I was also lucky when I was growing up to live down the road from a one-eyed Buckeye farmer named Cliff McMahon. Mr. McMahon described himself as one of the luckiest men alive. I went to school with one of his sons and participated in 4H so I got to know Cliff, a tanker with the 1st Armored Division, who had lost an eye at Kasserine Pass crewing an M-3 Grant tank. The M-3, predecessor to the Sherman, was even worse, with the main gun, a low velocity 75mm, located in a sponson on the side, making it necessary to traverse the whole tank in order to engage targets on the move. Worse than that, however, was the fact that the Grant had riveted armor plate rather than cast, and when struck even a glancing blow with a German anti-tank projectile, would blow the rivets inward, ricocheting around the inside like so many bullets. It was one of these that took out Cliff's eye and ended his war.

M-3 Grant tank with riveted construction.

Cliff called himself the luckiest man alive because of all the men in his tank company in North Africa, very few survived to the end of the war.

M-3 Grant tank after an encounter with the Germans in North Africa.

Fury, the tank in the movie, is an M4A3E8, known as an "Easy Eight." Upgraded from earlier Shermans in response to its glaring deficiencies, the Easy Eight has much better suspension and a high-velocity 76mm gun which at least gave it a fighting chance against most German tanks, although the frontal armor of the Tigers would still resist them. Most tank-to-tank kills with such behemoths were accomplished by flanking tactics of the more numerous Shermans, getting around the Germans for a flank or rear shot. This was necessarily wasteful of tanks and their precious crews and is portrayed with nail-biting accuracy in Fury.

I had a few quibbles with the final climactic battle scene, but all in all, Fury is one of the best war movies I've ever seen, better certainly than Saving Private Ryan. (Plus, I loved the Grease Guns killing Nazis.)

Confusion reigns in the firearm-ignorant press, with the Canadian jihadi's weapon described as a "30-30 Winchester lever action shotgun." From the photographs (above and those at the scene) it seems plain that the weapon was in fact a Model 94 rifle in caliber .30-30. This comes as a distinct disappointment to the firearm confiscationist blood dancers who no doubt are weeping that a semi-auto "assault rifle" was not used. In the American context, the gun grabbers understand that, as much as they'd like, lever-action rifles are off the menu for now since to advocate their confiscation would be to rouse the great, somnambulant giant known as Elmer Fudd and fill him with a terrible resolve. (It remains to be seen how a drug addict living in a homeless shelter was able to conceal the long gun.)

Much has been been speculated upon in what passes for the cable news "press" about the precise links between the Parliament shooter and the other Canadian jihadi who plowed into soldiers with his car the day before (killing one) and their links to ISIS -- as if that matters. They are missing the whole point of 4th Generation Warfare. No orders need be given, no money needs to change hands. In 4GW, the targets are known and understood by all, the individual actions are targeted to specific enemy vulnerabilities. It is the IDEA that is weaponized. This makes defending against such attacks almost impossible, since you cannot kill an idea, nor can you trace a command structure that doesn't exist, nor "decapitate" it if you could find it.

As for the individuals who carry out the attacks, the only concern is how to avoid detection while sizing up, stalking and taking down the command structure of your enemy -- the war makes and decision takers. In retrospect we should be grateful that this jihadi didn't think that through and went for a common, unarmed soldier at a war memorial rather that heading directly for the high-value targets on Parliament Hill.

As disappointed as the gun confiscationists must be at the facts of this case, they (especially those in the state of Connecticut) should pay attention to this truth -- if you start a civil war by raiding heretofore law-abiding Americans for their politically-incorrect firearms, you will not be able to defend against the 4GW attacks that you spark. And, I daresay, the folks who come after the warmakers and decision takers in righteous self-defense in the context of an American civil war that the gun raiders start will not be addled, inadequate jihadis.

As an aside, and totally unrelated, are you sure, Governor Malloy, that you don't want to publicly declare that enforcement of your Intolerable Act will be suspended until the Supreme Court has a chance to rule? Or are you going to give in to the darker impulses of Mike "KGB" Lawlor and start the gun raids after your re-election? Some reflections upon the lessons of 4GW might be in order, don't you think? I'm just trying to help you out, here.

It is no secret to my friends that the M-3A1 "Grease Gun" has long been my favorite submachine gun. (It is also no secret to the ATF, apparently, since three times in the 90s snitches tried to offer me one for sale in a "can't miss" deal. Each time I picked up the phone and called the state police and the snitch went away. The devil, it must be said, knows your temptations better than you do so be prepared to resist them.)

I first fired an original M-3 back in the 70s -- a specimen that bore no paperwork since it had been stolen by someone else, who stole it from someone else, who, presumably, stole it from Uncle Sugar. This was during my Benedict Arnold period when I handled quite a lot of illegal weapons. I have loved that clunky, junky SMG chambered in the justly revered caliber of .45 ACP ever since.

Thursday, October 23, 2014

A human blockade temporarily formed on I-75/85 northbound Wednesday evening as protesters halted traffic. The incident was part of a protest in response to the Aug. 9 fatal shooting of a 18-year-old African-American by a white police officer in Ferguson, Mo.

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

I can't believe it. We danced in the blood of Newtown and we couldn't get more gun control. We smuggled Kalashnikovs to the cartels so they could be found beside dead Mexicans and it blew up in our faces thanks to those damn bloggers. We couldn't even keep that a secret. If we hadn't blackmailed Boehner, who knows where that might have ended? (Expletive deleted.)

Outgoing Attorney Gen. Eric Holder on Monday listed the Obama administration’s inability to enact more stringent gun control regulations as among the biggest failures of his tenure, saying the matter “weighs heavily” on his mind. “I think the inability to pass reasonable gun safety laws after the Newtown massacre is something that weighs heavily on my mind,” Holder said during an interview aired on CNN. . .

“And the thought that we could not translate that horror into reasonable — I mean, really reasonable gun safety measures that were supported by the vast majority of the American people is for me something that I take personally as a failure,” he said, “and something that I think we as a society should take as a failure, a glaring failure, that I hope will ultimately be rectified.”

“Many sheriffs in states that recently passed gun-control laws have signed letters saying they are opposed to the laws, saying the gun bans won’t make America safer. Some even say they won’t enforce these new laws. This has gotten some press. What hasn’t been reported is the very governors in New York, Connecticut and Maryland who signed those gun and magazine bans are also reluctant to enforce these laws. It seems they don’t want a political backlash. They don’t want journalists making martyrs out of otherwise law-abiding citizens who might be charged with felonies for doing what they’ve done all their lives. This is where politics runs into reality. It’s a collision voters need to hear more about.

Actually, a majority of sheriffs in New York and Colorado publicly oppose the new gun-control laws. Sheriffs are in a unique position to speak out, as nearly all of America’s 3,080 sheriffs are elected. These sheriffs aren’t standing alone like Gary Cooper in “High Noon.” Polls show that a lot of the men and women who protect us support the Second Amendment. In 2013, a survey of police officers by the National Association of Chiefs of Police found that 86.8 percent of those surveyed think “any law-abiding citizen [should] be able to purchase a firearm for sport and self-defense.” Also, a survey done by PoliceOne.com of 15,000 law-enforcement professionals found that almost 90 percent of officers believe that casualties related to guns would be decreased if armed citizens were present at the onset of an active-shooter incident. More than 80 percent of PoliceOne’s respondents support arming schoolteachers and administrators who willingly volunteer to train with firearms. Virtually all the survey’s respondents (95 percent) said a federal ban on the manufacture and sale of ammunition magazines that hold more than 10 rounds wouldn’t reduce violent crime.”

In fact, it’s recently been revealed that the actual target may have been Trooper Alex T. Douglass, and Corporal Dickson was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Why is this important? Well it appears that Trooper Douglass might have been having an affair with Mr. Frein’s wife. If true, that absolutely does not justify Mr. Frein’s actions if he is indeed the perpetrator. It makes it no less tragic. What it does raise is the question of whether the actions by the State Police are justifiable, truthful, and well measured. If true, then Mr. Frein is not an apparent threat to the local citizens, as the State Police have already acknowledged in their original statements. He is not even an offensive threat to the authorities, although I fear some may be injured in his pursuit.

Just yesterday, Lt. Col. Bivens of the Pennsylvania State Police stated: “Lethal force is authorized upon positive identification if he is not actively surrendering,” (http://abc13.com/news/accused-cop-killer-repeatedly-appears-then-eludes-manhunt/322722/). What happen to his right to trial? When did we give the State Police the right to be judge and jury? Or are they really trying to keep him quiet to protect the reputation of the troop? Maybe revenge for his actions? These thoughts are no more absurd than the image of Mr. Frein presented by the State Police and the assumptions they have made. Where’s Attorney General Holder and Mr. Sharpton?

Why am I reminded of this line? -- "Use of unnecessary violence in the apprehension of the Blues Brothers HAS been approved."

I picked up an old copy of Infantry magazine the other day, specifically
the September-October 2011 issue. In an article entitled Soldier Battlefield Effectiveness, pages 12-19, there is an interesting discussion of current Army thinking on small arms effectiveness. Much of it is an apologia for the M-4 system, but the discussion is very valuable.

A couple long-time friends and readers brought this to my attention from 1994:

In a city where name recognition is synonymous with success, Ron Klain has made a virtue of being unknown. As Attorney General Janet Reno’s chief of staff, he is all but invisible to the public but recognized in Democratic circles as the man to have on your side in a political or legal fight. A rare mix of top-flight lawyer and savvy politician, Klain shepherded the nominations of Reno and Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg through the Senate and steered the omnibus crime bill through the turbulent legislative process.

So, he's a firearm confiscationist AND a Waco cover-up participant. Just the kind of guy that inspires trust.

Sunday, October 19, 2014

I have been given a half dozen used BFDX BF-71B hand-held radios with batteries and chargers. . .

Along with nine used Motorola XTN series radios XU2600, also with batteries and chargers.

I am embarrassed to say that I am not a radio guy and have no experience with these units. Has any reader used them and are they of sufficient utility to have them looked at by someone who knows what they're doing?

I would suggest being prepared for the outrage that is almost certainly going to come from those who have invested so much in recent months in created the mythology of an innocent martyr shot down for no reason. Religious movements died hard, and the cult of St. Michael Brown will no go quietly. It probably shouldn’t be a surprise at all that some agitators are calling for not just “revenge,” but Palestinian-style terrorism.

Readers will recognize that I am not shy about denouncing militarized police violence. But in the Brown case -- should riots break out over a failure to indict -- that will be little more than a pretext for far greater evils. Rodney King did not deserve to be beaten by a mob of cops but that hardly made a difference to Reginald Denny or the other victims who died in the LA riots.

Reginald Denny dragged from his truck, LA Riots, 1992.

This does not happen in a vacuum. The collectivist race hustlers and this administration's Justice Department under Eric Holder (but I repeat myself) and their willing handmaidens in the propaganda corps formerly called the mainstream media have worked mightily to work up this frenzy since Obama came into office. The lead that flies and the blood that's spilled will be their responsibility.

The most dangerous thing about this is that if "get whitey" is what they want, get whitey is what they'll get, although not perhaps in the way they envision. The lumpenproletariat foot soldiers being manipulated could scarcely be considered long-term strategic thinkers. Nor for that matter are they tactical geniuses. For one thing, the numbers of the opposing sides of this race war they seek are hardly in their favor. For another, when you pick out your victims based on some collectivist reference point of skin color, ethnic origin, or religion, then your intended victims will come to see themselves -- and you -- in the same light.

Bosnia, before the break-up of Yugoslavia, was the most Westernized, cosmopolitan and truly diverse region of that country. But as the Serbs and then the Croats decided to craft their own futures along the lines of ethnic cleansing, Bosnians were disabused of their illusions violently. As David Rieff related in his book Slaughterhouse: Bosnia and the Failure of the West:

And if, by the fall of 1994, people in Bosnia did begin to identify themselves as Muslims and turn their backs on the multiculturalism they had fought for so desperately for almost three years to preserve, this was hardly surprising. They were being murdered as Muslims, made homeless as Muslims. "First I was a Yugoslav," a friend in Sarajevo said to me once. "Then I was a Bosnian. Now I'm becoming a Muslim. It's not my choice. I don't even believe in God. But after two hundred thousand dead, what do you want me to do? Everybody has to have a country to which he can belong."

This is what Ralph Peters describes as wars of blood and faith. And do you know who's crowing about -- and profiting from -- the current slide to race war? Why the reverse side of the same bloody collectivist coin -- the Klan and the neo-Nazis.

The challenge for those of us who claim to stand by the Founders' Republic and who believe that the Constitution extends to everyone regardless of race, creed, color or religion will be to maintain those beliefs in the face of a three-sided race war where many will be targeting us based upon skin color. We cannot be sucked into a false "us versus them" collectivist construct. On the other hand, we cannot be victims, nor permit innocent people -- of any race or creed -- to be victimized by race barbarians. Nor should we uncritically identify with the lawless bastards of the militarized police with the excuse that they are "our bastards."

Korean shopkeepers defend their businesses, LA Riots, 1992.

Fenton writes, "The heart is a drum. The drum has a snare. The snare is in the blood. The blood is in the air."

We may be coming to that once more. Pray to God that we do not become comfortable wearing the "racial enemy" mask that our collectivist enemies seek to press upon upon us. Think about these things now, reflect upon them, pray about them, talk them over with your friends and family. The more intellectually prepared we are for what's coming, the better we can meet the challenge in a way that will not shame us in the eyes of our ancestors who fought and died to build and maintain this republic.

"Progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress."

I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air – that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave. -- H.L. Mencken

On the efficacy of passive resistance in the face of the collectivist beast. . .

Had the Japanese got as far as India, Gandhi's theories of "passive resistance" would have floated down the Ganges River with his bayoneted, beheaded carcass. -- Mike Vanderboegh.

In the future . . .

When the histories are written, “National Rifle Association” will be cross-referenced with “Judenrat.” -- Mike Vanderboegh to Sebastian at "Snowflakes in Hell"

"Smash the bloody mirror."

If you find yourself through the looking glass, where the verities of the world you knew and loved no longer apply, there is only one thing to do. Knock the Red Queen on her ass, turn around, and smash the bloody mirror. -- Mike Vanderboegh

From Kurt Hoffman over at Armed and Safe.

"I believe that being despised by the despicable is as good as being admired by the admirable."

From long experience myself, I can only say, "You betcha."

"Only cowards dare cringe."

The fears of man are many. He fears the shadow of death and the closed doors of the future. He is afraid for his friends and for his sons and of the specter of tomorrow. All his life's journey he walks in the lonely corridors of his controlled fears, if he is a man. For only fools will strut, and only cowards dare cringe. -- James Warner Bellah, "Spanish Man's Grave" in Reveille, Curtis Publishing, 1947.

"We fight an enemy that never sleeps."

"As our enemies work bit by bit to deconstruct, we must work bit by bit to REconstruct. Be mindful where we should be. Set goals. We fight an enemy that never sleeps. We must learn to sleep less." -- Mike H. at What McAuliffe Said

"The Fate of Unborn Millions. . ."

"The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves; whether they are to have any property they can call their own; whether their Houses, and Farms, are to be pillaged and destroyed, and they consigned to a State of Wretchedness from which no human efforts will probably deliver them. The fate of unborn Millions will now depend, under God, on the Courage and Conduct of this army-Our cruel and unrelenting Enemy leaves us no choice but a brave resistance, or the most abject submission; that is all we can expect-We have therefore to resolve to conquer or die." -- George Washington to his troops before the Battle of Long Island.

"We will not go gently . . ."

This is no small thing, to restore a republic after it has fallen into corruption. I have studied history for years and I cannot recall it ever happening. It may be that our task is impossible. Yet, if we do not try then how will we know it can't be done? And if we do not try, it most certainly won't be done. The Founders' Republic, and the larger war for western civilization, will be lost.

But I tell you this: We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.

And when we are gone, the scattered, free survivors hiding in the ruins of our once-great republic will sing of our deeds in forbidden songs, tending the flickering flame of individual liberty until it bursts forth again, as it must, generations later. We will live forever, like the Spartans at Thermopylae, in sacred memory.

-- Mike Vanderboegh, The Lessons of Mumbai:Death Cults, the "Socialism of Imbeciles" and Refusing to Submit, 1 December 2008

"A common language of resistance . . ."

"Colonial rebellions throughout the modern world have been acts of shared political imagination. Unless unhappy people develop the capacity to trust other unhappy people, protest remains a local affair easily silenced by traditional authority. Usually, however, a moment arrives when large numbers of men and women realize for the first time that they enjoy the support of strangers, ordinary people much like themselves who happen to live in distant places and whom under normal circumstances they would never meet. It is an intoxicating discovery. A common language of resistance suddenly opens to those who are most vulnerable to painful retribution the possibility of creating a new community. As the conviction of solidarity grows, parochial issues and aspirations merge imperceptibly with a compelling national agenda which only a short time before may have been the dream of only a few. For many Americans colonists this moment occurred late in the spring of 1774." -- T.H. Breen, The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence, Oxford University Press, 2004, p.1.